Kung Hee Fat Choy

First photo: Kingston Poon, 3, and sister Vivian Poon, 1, compete in a Chinese attire contest for keiki as festival Chairwoman Sarah Shim describes their costumes for the spectators during the Maui Chinese New Year Festival 2019 on Saturday at Queen Ka’ahumanu Center in Kahului. Kingston placed second in the boys division. Shim said the event drew a good crowd despite a last-minute venue change to Queen Ka’ahumanu Center. “It’s going really well,” Shim said. “I want to give credit to Queen Ka’ahumanu Center. For me, it’s a day of celebration of our Chinese culture, traditions and food. We even have a lot of vendors who flew over from Oahu.”

Second photo: Jamie Wong of Phoenix Dance Chamber performs solo contemporary Chinese dance “Dancing in the Rain” on Saturday at Queen Ka’ahumanu Center. The dance group is based on Oahu. Chinese New Year actually began Feb. 5 and marked the beginning of the Year of the Pig.

Third photo: Maui Chinese Arts Academy sifu Steve Catugal (right) takes on his students in a mock battle during Saturday’s kung fu demonstration.

The Maui News / MATTHEW THAYER photos

South Maui Renewables Resources, shown here in a photo taken last November, and Ku‘ia Solar were paid a total of about $150,000 by Maui Electric Co. per their power purchase agreements for “compensable curtailed energy” for 2018. MECO is asking the state Public Utilities Commission to allow the utility to pass the cost for 1.4 gigawatt hours of solar power that was produced but not used on to ratepayers. The Maui News / MATTHEW THAYER photo

A real estate sign is shown on a property in 2018. While median home prices continue to rise over the same period last year, single-family residential home sales dropped 27.6 percent as compared to January 2018, while inventory decreased 15.4 percent to 495 for single-family homes and 19.7 percent to 566 for condominiums. The Maui News / MATTHEW THAYER photo